


Courage

by LemonadeGarden



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen, Scarecrow's Fear Toxin (DCU)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-08
Updated: 2018-08-08
Packaged: 2019-06-23 22:32:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15616461
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LemonadeGarden/pseuds/LemonadeGarden
Summary: Bruce gets hit with Fear toxin. Dick is there to help out.





	Courage

**Author's Note:**

  * For [batwayneman](https://archiveofourown.org/users/batwayneman/gifts).



_Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear._

_~ Mark Twain_

 

Robin was scared. 

He wouldn't admit it, but Dick could tell over the phone. The anger in his voice, the shakiness. The sullen tone.  

“He's not responsive,” he was saying. 

“Just bring him home. The batmobile's on autopilot, it'll be fine. Just– just keep talking to him,” Dick said into the phone, keeping his voice low. He was in the locker room in the precinct in Bludhaven, rapidly changing into his civilian clothes.

“I am,” Damian said, his voice a tight, thin thread, “but he won't  _ say _ anything.”

“What do you mean, he won't say anything?” Dick says, pushing open the locker room door with one hand, his duffel bag thrown over his shoulder.

“He won't say a word. He just keeps looking at me, like I'm– like I'm some kind of–” Damian cut himself off. When he started speaking again, his voice was stiff. “His eyes are dilated. And he's hyperventilating. The batmobile sensors says that his heart rate is at 120.”

Jesus. Dick saw Peterson at the coffee machine, going through his phone. 

“Hey, Sarge,” he said, “you mind telling the Captain that I gotta leave early tonight? Family emergency.”

Peterson frowned. “Grayson, there's a debrief today. About the bay area murderer. You can't miss it. All officers have to be present.”

Dick sighed. “Look, Nick, please just tell the Captain I can't make it. My dad's sick.”

Peterson shook his head, going back to scrolling through his Facebook feed. “I'll tell him,” he said, “but I can't guarantee that he'll be okay with it.”

“Okay. Okay, that's fine. Thanks, Nick,” Dick said, grabbing his wallet and keys off his desk. He shoved them into his pocket. 

“That's sergeant Peterson for you,” Peterson said, still looking at his phone.

“Thanks Sarge,” Dick called out, and he was already out the door. 

“Tell your dad to get well soon!” Peterson yelled back. 

“Richard, are you even listening?” Damian said, and he sounded angry enough to be near tears. He wasn't just scared, Dick realised. He was terrified. 

“Of course I'm listening,” Dick said soothingly, getting into his car. He backed out of his parking spot and onto the road in one swift turn. 

It would take three hours to reach Gotham. Two and a half if he avoided the turnpike. Two fifteen if he asked Babs to make all the traffic lights along the way green. 

He sighed. He couldn't do that. 

“He's shaking,” Damian was saying over the phone. “We're almost home.”

“Shaking? Like a seizure?” Dick said, trying to sound calm. There needed to be at least one calm person in this conversation. 

“No, like shock,” Damian said, “and he keeps trying to get out of the car. He's– he's trying to open the car door. He won't listen to me.”

There was definitely a quaver in Damian's voice at that last sentence, there. 

“Okay, Damian,” Dick said, “you've locked the doors, haven't you?”

“Of course I've locked them,” Damian said, testily, “how stupid do you think I am?”

“I don't think you're stupid at all,” Dick said, trying to stay calm, “If the doors are locked, Bruce can't get out. Just get him to the cave. Alfred will take care of things, okay? And I'm on my way.” 

“It'll take you _hours_ ,” Damian said, and he sounded so miserable and frightened that Dick's chest broke open, “and he can't wait that long.”

“He doesn't need me as much as he needs the antidote, okay Dami? It's going to be okay. I need to drive now, but I can leave you on speakerphone if you wanna keep talking.” 

“No,” Damian said, sounding quieter, “we're here anyway. I have to help Pennyworth get him out and onto a stretcher.”

“Okay,” Dick said, “you did good. You did really good.”

“Come quickly,” was all Damian said, before he hung up. 

Dick drove through the traffic like a madman, switching lanes and overtaking cars. He couldn't do anything once he got into gridlock though, and he was stuck in the middle of a knot of traffic, while his father was drugged out of his mind and half-dead in a cave. He looked at the stoplight. Still red.

The dial tone was still in his ear. 

“Shit,” he muttered. 

He called another number, one that he’d had on speed dial since he'd been fourteen.

“Dick?” Said the answering voice.

“Babs, I need a favour,” Dick said. 

*

The first time Dick had ever inhaled Scarecrow's fear gas, he'd been nine and a half. 

He hadn't been able to breathe, or even think, much less talk. By the time Bruce had realised what had happened, and taken him back to the cave, he was having a full-on attack.

“He's going to fracture a rib if he doesn't calm down,” Alfred was saying. Then there was a hand on his back, soothing, stroking. 

“Dick,” said a voice, “it's going to be okay. Come here.”

But Dick was shaking his head already, wrenching himself out of Bruce's grip, tears streaming down his face. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't  _ breathe. _

He tried to run, run away from the dark of the cave, the image of his parents lying on the dirt of the circus floor, their blood and brains mixing with the muck, and then he was slipping on it, on the blood, and he falling through all the safety nets a hundred times, a thousand times. 

He was curled up on the floor, he realised, sobbing quietly. His heart wouldn't stop racing. 

Someone scooped him up, pulling him close. He barely even noticed. 

He was being carried across the cave and then upstairs, and then to the first floor, and then to the guest bedroom on the right of the landing. 

The bedroom had a walk-in closet. Not much bigger than the size of a small elevator, but big enough for them to both fit. Bruce sat down on the wooden floor of the closet, and pulled the door shut behind him. There was only a narrow beam of light coming in from the tiny crack between the door and the wooden frame of the closet.

Then Bruce pulled Dick onto his lap, and just held him there, rocking back and forth. There, under the soft, fur coats and heavy jackets, it felt like they were in a little cocoon of their own. In a small world, without any one else. Just the two of them. 

Bruce was saying things to him, whispering words and consolations, but Dick tuned them out, tuned everything out except the small space and the arms around him, rocking him back and forth. Back and forth. Rhythmically. The four bare walls calmed him down. Outside, everything had been too much. In here, things were. . . simpler. Quieter. 

Eventually his breaths slowed down enough to sync with Bruce's movements, and then he felt a hand smooth back his sweat-damp hair, and the prick of a small needle on the inside of his elbow. 

“Just a sedative,” Bruce murmured. They hadn't developed the antidotes, back then. When you got hit with the gas, you just had to tough it out. 

Bruce didn't stop smoothing back his hair, or rocking him back and forth. They must have stayed in that closet for an hour, and Bruce never once complained. He stayed in there with him until Dick fell asleep, his face covered in dried tear tracks. 

“How did you know I liked small spaces?” Dick had asked him, years later. It had been one hell of a risk to take. Most people under the influence of fear toxin for claustrophobic. Dick could have hurt himself in his panic. Could've hurt Bruce. 

“You grew up in a trailer. And I always found you under my desk when you were upset, remember?” Bruce said. “You used to say that it was your real bedroom.” 

Dick smiled. They didn't call Bruce the world's greatest detective for nothing. 

“Yeah,” he said, “I remember.”

*

When he got to the cave, Bruce was sitting up on the stretcher and looking up at the ceiling, breathing really fast. 

“The fan,” Bruce said, the moment he came in, “it's going to drop on you.” 

Dick looked up at the ceiling fan. It was directly above him. 

“That's not going to happen, B,” Dick said, although he stepped out from underneath it. He went over to the stretcher instead. 

“Did Al give you the first dose?” He asked. 

Bruce nodded. He was wearing a hoodie and sweats. They must have gotten him to change out of the batsuit, somehow. That was good. 

“Where's Damian?” Dick said. 

“Went upstairs,” Bruce said. He was still looking at the ceiling intently. “Angry.”

“I'll speak to him, okay? He's just shaken up.” 

Bruce didn't say anything. He was clenching his fist real hard. There was blood leaking out of it.

Dick frowned, grabbing his hand and opening it. Bruce had dug his fingernails hard enough into his palm to draw blood. 

“Bruce, you can't do that,” Dick said, softly. 

Bruce looked at his hand like he was noticing it for the first time. 

“Oh,” he said. Then he started to look at the ceiling fan again. 

Dick sighed. “Where's Alfred? I'll go get some bandages for you.”

Bruce pointed wordlessly to the console room. Dick walked in that direction.

In the console room, Alfred looking at something under a microscope, while the centrifuge besides him was running. It was filled with test tubes of blood, Dick realised. Bruce's blood. 

“Jesus,” he said, “how much blood did you take?”

“Only a few syringes,” Alfred said, “some of them are old. Blood uncontaminated by the fear toxin, to serve as the control for the experimental antidote.”

“Experimental?” Dick said, “is this one new?”

“The fear gas? Yes, I'm afraid it is. It seems to be a new strain altogether. Something that's resistant to the antidotes. I gave master Wayne a sedative to stop him from going into shock, but the panic is still there. I was testing against the blood to see if a mixture of C-12 and F-01 might work, but–”

There was a loud, thunderous crash from the other room, and Dick ran back to where he'd left Bruce, his heart pounding. 

Bruce was standing in the centre of the room. He was looking down at something near his feet. There was a grapple gun in his hand. The grapple was attached to the rotors of one of the ceiling fan’s blades, which was currently on the floor. Bruce had wrenched the whole entire thing down from the ceiling. Its blades were still spinning lazily. The fan was hissing and clicking intermittently, its exposed wires sparking. 

“Bruce,” Dick said, very softly, “you should probably step away from the fan.”

Bruce jumped a little, and whipped around to look at him, like he'd forgotten that he'd even come in the first place. His eyes were wide. They looked hunted.

“The sparks, master Bruce,” Alfred said. He'd come to the medical room too, and he was standing at the doorway, “they could burn you.”

Bruce stepped back, warily. His hand was shaking. It was still around the grapple gun. 

If Damian had heard the noise and came down now . . . he didn't know how Bruce would react to that. 

“Why don't you drop the grapple gun, Bruce,” Dick said, his voice easy, “you don't need it anymore, do you?”

Bruce shook his head. 

“Just hand it over to me, okay? Nice and slow,” Dick said, going up to him carefully. 

Bruce watched him, an unreadable expression on his face. Dick tried to go for a smile. “It's just me,” he said, “just Dick. I'm not going to do anything, okay? Just going to take the gun.” 

He reached ever so slowly towards Bruce's hand, and took the gun from him. Bruce just watched him. 

Dick put a hand on Bruce's shoulder. “Let's get you back in bed, okay? And let's get that hand wrapped up.”

Bruce let Dick lead him back to the stretcher, where he sat and watched him as he taped up his hand. Alfred went back to the console room, telling them he was going to call Leslie and see if she had any ideas about the antidote.

Bruce was just staring at his hand. He blinked a couple of times, like he was waking up.

“I'm bleeding,” he said, slowly. 

“Yeah, Bruce,” Dick said. 

“Did someone hurt me?” Bruce asked. He seemed confused. That happened, sometimes. The gas made you disoriented. 

“No, it was just an accident.” Dick said, “Everything's okay, now.”

“Did someone hurt Damian?” Bruce said, and his breathing was starting to pick up again. 

Dick looked up. “No, Bruce. Damian’s fine.”

Bruce was getting up already, pushing off of the stretcher. “I have to check on him,” he said, “I have to see if he's– if he's okay. He was sick last week. Shouldn't have let him–”

“Bruce,” Dick said, forcefully, “Damian's fine. Nothing happened to him. You're the one that got hit with the gas, remember?”

Bruce shook his head. “No, it was Damian,” he said, and he sounded so sure that even Dick wavered, for a second. Maybe Damian  _ had _ got exposed too, and he was just hiding it. Then he discarded that theory. You couldn't hide being hit with fear gas. Not even Batman could. 

“Bruce,” he said, quietly, “it wasn't Damian. Damian's fine, I promise.”

“Why isn't he here?” Bruce was saying, looking around wildly. “I told him not to leave my side when we're at patrol. Isn't safe.”

“You're not patrolling anymore, B,” Dick said, getting Bruce to sit down again. “Damian's upstairs, in his room. He's alright.”

Bruce sat down. Dick started taping the rest of his hand, pulling up a chair next to the stretcher. It wasn't shallow; Bruce had really dug in his fingernails.

There was a hand in his hair, and Dick looked up. 

“You'll stay,” Bruce said, his voice thin. It was a question. 

“Of course,” he grinned. “Who else’ll clean up that mess you made, huh?” He said, pointing to the fan that was lying on the floor, still sparking occasionally. 

Bruce looked at it. “I'm sorry,” he said. 

“Aw, that's okay, Bruce. It's not your fault. Lie down for a sec, kay? I'll go get Zitka.” 

Bruce smiled at that. It was small, but it was still a smile.

He reached into one of the cupboards above the medical workstation, and pulled the little, stuffed elephant out of it. It was looking slightly threadbare, and had definitely seen better days. Alfred had patched it up countless times for him, when he was still a boy. He used to cuddle with Zitka when he was sick, or feeling upset, and then over the years it had become a running joke to give Bruce the elephant when he got banged up on patrol. 

Dick didn't care what Bruce said; he knew Bruce secretly liked it. 

“Thank you,” Bruce said, dryly, when Dick held it out to him. Bruce took it, and put it next to him, so its head was propped up on the pillow. 

“Just stay still,” Dick said, grinning and taking his phone out, “I have to send a photo of this to Babs.”

Bruce smiled ruefully at the camera, with Zitka sitting next to him. Dick took the picture. 

“I've got blackmail material on you now,” Dick grinned, putting his phone back in his pocket. 

“Jason has a picture of me in a superman t-shirt,” Bruce said, lying down on the stretcher. Zitka was next to his head. It was only about the cutest thing ever, “I don't believe anything can get worse than that.”

“Nah, this is worse,” Dick said, and he sat back down on the chair next to the stretcher. 

This was one of the lucid stretches Bruce was having, Dick knew. Five minutes later.he'd be trying to rip fans from the ceiling again. 

He really hoped Alfred was working on that antidote quick. 

“So,” Dick said, propping his chin on one of his hands, “what's been going on in Gotham?” 

Bruce shrugged. “The usual,” he said. He was looking off to a side, like he was somewhere far away. Dick knew that things had been. . . rough, after Selina had left. 

“Hey, Bruce,” Dick said, “you know I'm always here if you need to talk, right?”

Bruce looked at him, his eyes slightly unfocused. 

Dick grabbed hold of his hand. “I'm here,” he said again.

Alfred came into the room, an ampule of a pale, translucent yellow liquid in his hands. 

“This may work,” he said, “but I have my doubts.”

Dick went to go get a syringe, and a fresh needle. It was on the worktable next to the stretcher. 

Bruce's eyes followed him as he moved. 

“So anyway, what's this I'm hearing about Damian taking up theatre, Alfred?” Dick said, good-naturedly. Maybe he could lighten things up a bit. 

“Master Damian seems to have quite latched onto the idea of playing Macbeth in the school play,” Alfred said, taking the syringe that Dick handed to him. He filled it with the antidote, and then tapped it with a finger.

Bruce rolled up the sleeve of his hoodie slowly. His breathing was quickening again. He was looking at Alfred warily.

“Macbeth, for middle-schoolers? That's kind of heavy, isn't it?” Dick said, lightly. He was quick, but Bruce had always been quicker. If he wanted, he could lunge for the syringe and stick it in Alfred's eye in three seconds. 

Dick patted Bruce's arm. “Hey, are you listening?”

Bruce looked at him, swallowing. “What,” he rasped. 

“I said Macbeth is a little heavy for kids Damian's age. Don't you think so?”

Alfred injected Bruce with the antidote, and Bruce closed his eyes, exhaling.

“It's an abridged version,” Bruce said, finally. “No one dies.” 

“Oh, Dick said, “that's a shame. I'm pretty sure Damian's disappointed.”

“He is,” Bruce said. He was rolling his sleeve back down like he couldn't do it quick enough.

Alfred covered his mouth to yawn politely. 

“You go to bed, Al,” Dick said, “I'll sit up with B.”

“Thank you,” Alfred said, “and good night, master Dick.”

“Good night.”

Alfred went over to Bruce, and for a moment, he just rested a hand on Bruce's head. Warm and protective. 

“You'll be quite alright, master Bruce,” Alfred said, quietly, “just like you always are.”

Bruce nodded, looking down. He was pretty much leaning into Alfred's hand. Alfred gave him one last fond look, and then he went upstairs.

That left just the two of them in the cave. 

Dick checked the wall-clock. “So I have an idea,” he said. 

“Hmm,” Bruce said. His eyes were still closed, and he was taking deep, controlled breaths. He was meditating. Bruce called it 'centering himself’. Jason called it 'Bruce’s feng-shui chakra aligning shit’.

“You, me and the kiddo. Let's go to your room and watch some movies.”

“Or, we could not,” Bruce said, “and I could just sit here and finish tonight's report.”

“Bruce, I bet you can't even type anything right now. No way you're doing paperwork. We're going to watch a Pixar movie that makes us cry, come on.” He said, holding out a hand for Bruce. 

“A Pixar movie that makes  _ you _ cry,” Bruce said, but he took the hand, getting off the stretcher. So that was a win in Dick's book. 

They walked past the wreckage of the broken fan, and they took the elevator upstairs to the third floor. 

Bruce tipped his head against the wall, closing his eyes. Dick looked at him for a while. 

“Dad?” he said, slowly. 

Bruce opened his eyes, looking at Dick. Dick didn't use that word a lot. 

“You're okay, right?” He asked. 

Bruce looked away again. The door opened, and they stepped out. 

“I don't know,” Bruce said. 

Dick hugged him. 

Bruce’s arms came around him automatically, but he definitely squirmed a bit there. “Dick,” he said, sounding a little embarrassed. 

“Shut up,” Dick said, his eyes shut tight against Bruce's hoodie, “you need a hug.”

“I'm fine. Really,” Bruce was saying. 

“You will be after I finish hugging you. And you tell me what's wrong. Is it– you know. What happened with Selina?”

Bruce frowned, shaking his head. “If isn't. . . just that.” 

Dick pulled away, looking at him worriedly. “Then what?” He said.

Bruce was studying the carpet. He was brilliant at everything, fighting and gadgets and engineering and coming up with military strategy, but stupid as hell when it came to talking about his feelings.

“It's the house,” Bruce said, pausing a little, “it's always empty now. Damian leaves a lot to work with his team, and Tim and Jason have their own apartments. Cass is– she isn't one for settling down. It's quiet. And big.”

They walked down the hall, towards Damian's room.

“You know how I feel about big,” Dick said. 

Bruce smiled, a little. “Not good.”

“Not good,” Dick laughed. He put an arm around his dad, “but seriously, if you wanted, I could start coming around more. Like, way more. They're setting up a new drug investigation unit at the precinct anyway, and a lot of the work is out of Gotham. I could apply. Just say the words, B,” Dick said.

Bruce frowned. “I couldn't do that to you. You have a life there.”

“I have a life here too,” Dick said, “Babs lives here. Hell, my dad and my baby brother live here. All of my family, too. And what the hell’s Tim doing living on his own? How come that knucklehead got to move out at seventeen and I had to be dropped to the movies by Alfred until I was like, twenty one?”

Bruce chuckled. “No one dropped you to any movie theatres when you were twenty one. And Tim is living in his dorm at Princeton. He moved last week.”

“Oh, right,” Dick said, scratching his head. Now he felt like shit. “I missed him moving out?”

“You were busy with a case. I thought I'd call you afterwards to tell you.”

“You know what,” Dick said, firmly, “I’m missing too much shit. I'll do it. I'll apply for the transfer. And I'll live in the manor till I'm old and senile. I'll never move out.”

Bruce laughed. “If you insist,” he said. But he sounded kind of glad. 

They'd reached Damian's door. It was shut. Locked too, no doubt. Dick knocked on it. 

“Hey Dami, wanna watch a Pixar movie?”

“Go away!” Damian yelled. 

“Damian,” Bruce said, “open the door, please.”

A pause. Then footsteps across the carpeted floor. The door cracked open the tiniest bit. 

“Father?” Damian said. His eyes were narrow. “You're okay?”

“I'm sorry I scared you like that,” Bruce said. The door opened all the way, and there Damian was, looking at Bruce, his face all pinched. He looked small. 

“I wasn't scared,” Damian said. He sounded almost angry. 

“Alright,” Bruce said, “I'm sorry I worried you.”

“Tt,” Damian said. “It is okay. I am. . . glad you are better.” 

Bruce held out his arms then, and Damian wavered for a moment before he crumbled, and ran into them. Bruce had his arms around him pretty tight, and Damian was clinging on too. 

“I  _ was _ scared,” Damian admitted, his voice muffled into Bruce's chest. 

“That's okay,” Bruce said quietly, “I was, too.”

Dick grinned. This was a shit day, and to be honest, probably a shit month for Bruce, but everything was going to be okay. 

And then he took a picture of the two of them, before anyone could notice. 

“So,” he said, “Ratatouille or Wall-E?”

Both of them groaned. Dick grinned again. 

“Ratatouille it is,” he said.

__  
  


 


End file.
